[pianotech] Caster Challenge

[David Boyce]

I was asked to fit new casters to the local theatre's Steinway. It's a 
hundred years old but was  rebuilt by Steinway about 35 years ago, and 
is excellent (I know, JD, hammer weight issues and all that!).

The piano has a timber A-frame, of I know not what provenance.  The old 
casters were not piano casters, but heavy duty industrial casters 
someone had fitted about 40 years ago. The nylon or neoprene wheels are  
perishing and crumbling as well as having flats on them.
This posed a challenge, as the old casters are 5" high.  Modern piano 
casters are about 2".  There was no scope to lower the height of the 
piano, the keys being at 28" from the floor.  I suspect that when the 
timber A-Frame was made, the legs may have been shortened to fit into 
it. Nor was it apparent whether the base of the legs would actually be 
removable from the A-Frame.

How to go about fitting new piano casters to the underside of the 
A-Frame, and maintain the correct height? I made blocks from 4 
thicknesses of 18mm (3/4") MDF glued together, fitted the new casters to 
them, and then jacked up the underside of the A-Frame with car jacks, 
and fitted the caster blocks.
It has worked well, if not all that prettily, and the piano is much more 
manoeuverable than before.
I listened to it in use last night at a wonderful concert of which I 
shall say more in another post.

I will need to send the pics in two lots.

Best regards,

David Boyce.
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